3.41 Paladin Build

hello everybody

i found nothing to paladin race, which i can play decently, so i will tell you something about them. one thing first: if you looking for a perfect never leak build, you might be wrong in here. you are right, if you want 7/15 at 21 with a very few leaks and a chance, to even improve the build (and im sure this can be done ^^)

to be honest, i didnt find any paladin build yet to handle lvl10 bosses without any leaks and having at least 7/3 after lvl10. it might work without archers, but those are pretty imba except lvl10 ^^ okay, lets start with unit overview:

tier1: almost never used it, it has no skill, but decent stats. wont be used in my tactic
tier2: elite archer are nice. in the beginning, one of the most powerful unit due to multishot. it rapes early levels, does very well against l7+l8. cons: become very weak at l14+; l10 will leak 1 or 2 bosses because their damage is spread to 5 enemies, while there are only 3 bosses.
tier3: our tank in the beginning, because knights are too expensive at that time. has good 1100 hp upgraded and a skill for reducing pierce damage (ONLY!) (perfect for l7 and l12)
tier4: a ranged unit with magic attack. we are lacking magic attack, and the priest will NOT change that. because of his heal (-> supporter unit), his attacking stats are bad. also, one heal isnt enough. i spam them 20+, when my income is high enough, but never build them before
tier5: the cavalier is your main tank which has also some offensive power. good damage and attack speed. his skill gives him a 30% chance to block 50 damage. what that exactly means? many creeps, except l14,15,17,20+ for sure do less than 50 damage each hit. so in fact, in many cases he has a 30% chance to fully absorb the damage. but be careful: its a probability, sometimes it doesnt trigger 10 attacks in a row and the cav is already dead and may cause a leak. but sometimes it triggers 5 times in a row and he just got no damage.
tier6: another dragon style tower, can't compare to fenix or neos, but is better than some others so i would rate it average. but at the time you can spam your tier6, you can also change the builder (recommended)

okay, enough about the units, here is my strategy:

note: sometimes the wisps/upgrades are built in fight. its more for overview

lvl1: 1x elite archer, 1x wisp
-> MUST be built next to the wall to prevent massive surrounding. archer kills all without any problems then. dunno if a whelp will be a serious problem, most ppl send dino at l2

lvl2: 1x archer, 2x wisp
-> you will kill the whole wave even with dino, but the dino wont die. never. bye bye 6 gold ;D

lvl3: upgrade to elite, 1x wisp
-> np level

lvl4: 1x elite archer (you have 3 elite now and 4/0), wisp, lumper1
-> np, maybe even overpowered

lvl5: footman in front of elite with a space between. elite have a nice range, and creeps need to move when footman is dead. more time to shoot, simple as that.
-> np, slightly op

lvl6: upgrade footman, build another one
-> still np

lvl7: upgrade footman. (build a third if you expect your mates to leak horribly) (you should have 3x elite, 2x guard; 5/1). ACTIVATE THE SKILL OF GUARD!!
-> this level is why we are a little bit overpowered: it is a very tough level for most, but our shining level . elite have attack bonus, guard has defence bonus (-15% from pierce). we can handle l7 even with furbolg! also: i see it soooo many times people leaking massivly on lvl7. often even kingheals are needed. in our case not: we will be fed very nice if our mates leak ^^
build wisps while the round is active, so that you have 7/1.

lvl8: build a third/upgrade to guard, lumber2. DEACTIVATE SKILL OF GUARD!!! (it reduces movement speed)
-> due to magic attack, our guards die fast =/ can be tough if you get mad aura summons, in normal ways we have no problem here. do no forget to deactivate the skill, you will most likely leak otherwise.

lvl9: knight
-> lolzombies cant be leaked. enough said.

lvl10: cavalier (3x elite, 3x guard, 1x cav; 7/2 ~60 income [fast round with minor leaking]), footman if you want to raise your chances for 2 bosses, because:
-> ill say it directly and honestly: by now i plan with those leaks, because i tried this and that and i never killed all. elite must have a weakness...bosses are. nevermind...killing bosses seems to be a factor of too high value and/or random luck. if your guards and cav all focus on one boss (i.e. they block each other a bit and one is faster than the others), you will kill 2 bosses, otherwise it will be only one. also depends on cavs damage block luck.
if you are super unlucky with not focusing, stupid running around and not attacking and the cav blocks nothing, even none dies. but this happeneded to me with nearly all races because the ki sometimes just suck and its not your fault.


nice to have is an arena battle win, it will negate the missed money from boss(es). send auras: furbolg and hermit are nice. +3 armor is a static boost, hermits are ranged and will survive a bit for using their healing aura. a teammate should get commander, if not, np, 4% damage boost are only +1-2 damage on most towers by that time.

after l10 i upgrade to 7/4 in most cases. 7/3 in a bad round (0-1 boss, arena lose), 7/5 in a good round (l7 feed, 2 bosses, arena win)



lvl11: upgrade footman
-> np

lvl12: build 2nd cavalier. [or 2 knights, of you have less than 420 gold (should have more)]
-> 7/5 while round is active

lvl13: 3rd knight. [or upgrade one to cav]
-> np, the last round where you really notice the elite archer damage . upgrade to 7/6

lvl14: upgrade 3rd cav, build new knight. (you should have: 3x elite, 4x guard, 3 cav and 1 knight; 7/6 with ~140 inc)
-> all melee have attack bonus, np here.

lvl15: 7/7 and 7/8 should be ready now or while l15 is running
-> np

lvl16: dragonhawk
-> tough level, 7/9 while active

lvl17: upgrade to royal
-> hardest level besides l10 because we have no siege attack unit, with auras you will leak about 5-10 golems, do 7/10

lvl18: hawk
-> np, 7/11 while running

lvl19: upgrade royal, 7/12

lvl20: royal (now you should have: 3x elite, 4x guard, 5x cavalier, 3x royal, 7/12 with 350-400 inc)
-> how many turtles you kill sadly depends on the ki: if your units focus, you kill all three, if they spread their damage too much, you'll get 2 bosses (mostly)

lvl20+: yeah, we're done with the hard part. now the part begins where you shouldnt need much help:

- do 7/15. you should max it lvl21 or latest at beginning of lvl22. you'll end up with ~1k income, more or less depens on leaks and gametime
-> its up to you if you wanna spam more royals or change builder to get some helpful auras/better tier6
-> BEFORE YOU CHANGE BUILDER: build one line of priests! 10 priest give a solid 3k heal (upgraded) every 10 seconds.
nice races to have:
- nature: speed/slow auras, armor aura, tier6 has a second heal next to your priests (and even aoe)
- mech: captain is always nice to have, neotanks are uberstrong
- element: mana aura help your priests, fenix is the only comparable unit to neotanks imo. (warden has insane damage output, but melees will die faster than ranged damage dealer and often deal less damage overtime)
- ghost: -dmg% aura, meridian is a decent long range damage dealer

if you find goblin and some other stuff you cant really use like elf or demi, always take the goblin, build helicopter and switch again (or spam their tank). fenix, neos and meridians will love that thingy ^^

okaaaay, a wall of text, but now you know how you can play paladin. you can lower/delay the income for getting the bosses, but if you leak 2 and l10 and 1 at l20 you dont even lose 200 gold, for having 1k income at the end.

thanks for reading

---------------------------------

while writing this, i already saw some improvements that could be done. the way i play above works, and i didnt want to post pure theorycrafting here

- lvl3, 4 and 5 are overpowered, maybe this can be done more efficiently for getting wisps/lumber earlier. but i dont want change the setup for lvl7, so just the order of wisps and towers could be changed. needs some testing
- lvl12 can be done better, i often forget to put on the guards defence skill. maybe this can delay one knight and make an earlier lumber upgrade possible
- lvl20 can be made safe by delaying the lumber upgrades (or having the same with one more tower due to improvements) and another royal (has magic damage)

feel free to post your feedback, comments and improvements
greets terence


edit:
played some rounds again and made some new experiences
- royal spam works, they act kinda like the archers with their bouncing attack
- if you manage to have a fourth royal at 20, you have to be unlucky not to get all 3 bosses (possible by delaying lumber upgrades or some feed)

- btw leaking/feeding/leavers: had a game we played 2v4 from 3 to 14, then 2v3. you'll have much more summons and therefore more gold. i just changed my build and built one less guard (4->3) and one more cavalier (5->6) and it still had only problems on 10 and 17 (with pudge). my buddy leaked sometimes, the enemy often, every round lasted very long. this conditions led to my fourth griffin on l20, so i killed all 3. also, i was able to do 7/15 after l20.
sadly i dont know how much income i would have generated, i had 850 at the end of l26 when they decided to save 10k wood altogether and send us every aura existing + mass shamans. leaked 7+demon.
guess under these circumstances i would have made between 1,2k-1,3k. fast rounds should end at 900-1k income.

Terence123 wrote:hello everybody

lvl8: build a third/upgrade to guard, lumber2. DEACTIVATE SKILL OF GUARD!!! (it reduces movement speed)
-> due to magic attack, our guards die fast =/ can be tough if you get mad aura summons, in normal ways we have no problem here. do no forget to deactivate the skill, you will most likely leak otherwise.

after l10 i upgrade to 7/4 in most cases. 7/3 in a bad round (0-1 boss, arena lose), 7/5 in a good round (l7 feed, 2 bosses, arena win)

lvl11: upgrade footman
-> np

I got some things to say:

Guards have medium armor, meaning 20% magic dmg reduction.
The Guard skill can't be deactivated. It's not really active/deactivate skill, it's more like an innate ability.

If i did all those upgrades in level 10, where i'm supposed to get gold to upgrade footman at level 11??

At level 5, with 3 elite archers, you probably don't even need a footman. Try to reduce the value of your build, so you have a better income at first levels.

Ofc, mass-building gryphons riders for end game works. You do need to have high lumber and income to survive level 30, but the gryphons are really good at level 28 and level 29.
About healers, they are good, but I usually don't build more than 12 of them. One Griphon Rider is worth more than 2 high priests.

hey mate, please read the skill description of the unit guard:

Defend: While Defend is active, this units only take 85% of the damage from Piercing attacks and movement speed is reduced.

it is an active skill you have to click on. if you do so, a small animation appears and a buff-icon also. you will notice their reduced movement-speed. trust me, its no b/s

you need to "save" the money, which sometimes will cause you having just 7/3, and sometimes 7/5 if things went pretty well. i already wrote how you get the gold for 7/5 (l7 feed from mates, two l10 bosses, arena win). won't happen all the time, thats why i mostly come out with 7/4 ^^

the healer thing you are right. i normally build one row (9 healers) when my income is high enough to build and upgrade in max 2 rounds.

Terence123 wrote:hey mate, please read the skill description of the unit guard:

Defend: While Defend is active, this units only take 85% of the damage from Piercing attacks and movement speed is reduced.

Where does it say you need to activate it?

it is an active skill you have to click on. if you do so, a small animation appears and a buff-icon also. you will notice their reduced movement-speed. trust me, its no b/s

You ask me to read the skill description, so I ask you, to pay more attention to your units.

Create a single player game, set -ap, build and upgraded one Guard. DO NOT click his skill and type -start.





I already told huanak about "bug" but he said that he couldn't make the skill work like that, and end up being more of an innate skill.
But I couldn't find the topic, but i'm sure it is somewhere in this forum.

ah okay, normally i trust the descriptions ^^. good to know there is a bug. so i do not have to click on the skill, its active all the time? that would be crappy, because ranged levels are beaten by movementspeed if you have many melee ^^ thanks for the information

Terence123 wrote:ah okay, normally i trust the descriptions ^^. good to know there is a bug. so i do not have to click on the skill, its active all the time? that would be crappy, because ranged levels are beaten by movementspeed if you have many melee ^^ thanks for the information

If you never activate the ability, the unit should only activate it once he gets in melee range, so it's not that bad, and 30% movement reduction is not really a game breaker because only affect the guards. specially since 'cuz who kills ranged waves are usually range units, melee units just serve as meat shields.

i'll post an updated version at the weekend, sometimes i got bad leaks, mostly because of pudges on 14,15 or 17. the start can be optimized, 6/1 after l5 is possible. also found a mistake in the build =/

No offense but this guide seems pretty sloppily put together. You should give value updates and lumber updates more frequently and could offer more positioning advice. Paladin isn't too difficult to use and usually people use the pure archer builds to income more quickly. However, many people make the mistake of making way too many elite archer and then they leak 2 - 3 bosses at level 10. I have an archer build in my marine build thread at the request of someone, but didn't feel the need to give it a whole thread of its own. 7/3 with ~80+ income at lvl 10 is a general standard for paladin archer users and then they push to 7/5 - 7/6 during lvl 10 and get ~100 - 110 income during arena depending on the game circustances. I'm not saying your build is bad. It's just not the optimal use that most skilled players have come to use with paladin and it could use some cleaning up.

yeah, its not easy to read. had not the time to update and played a lot proph the last days...will do it someday...anyway, its hard to find a solid way to lvl20, coz its depends massively on summons. pudges on 15 or 17 are pretty bad for income because you need more towers to hold it.
found no way to kill lvl10, only the one with massive single archers you posted in the other thread. dont like it ^^

but honestly: what games are you playing to get 100+ income during arena? AND upgrading to 7/5 and using all ur lumber at that time? the only games i could almost reach that (80-90) were rounds with leaks every single round, maybe just one without leaks. show me a replay, wanna see that! have to learn that

btw: i don't care about value and won't post it. imo, it's an unprecise, nearly useless piece of information. it tells me nothing about the unit composition (i.e.: too much low hp ranged getting overrun), their strengths and weaknesses to different armor types/levels (i.e.: l17 and having no siege and 80% pierce damage), if they have problems with unit types (i.e.: aoe attackers against high hp units) or their special abilities like aura, stun etc. (i.e.: a proph gets heli and captain on his doomsdays. how many +value is that now? )
had 19k values killing lvl30 and 22k values dying lvl30

btw: is it only me or is paladin the worst boss-killer race in the entire game?
l10 is not possible with elite archer (and a "special" tactic)
l20 needs to be defended very well and is unsecure. mass priests or at least 3 gryphons are needed for magic dmg (cutting you income due to overdeff)
l30 is nearly impossible. leaked one of them even in a 7/15 round with mass gryphon spam (which in fact are just tier6 archers...they rape all levels, due to the bouncing attack, which deals a pretty large amount of damage though. but on 30 they couldnt kill the bosses fast enough. their low AS gives the bosses too much time to kill everything in sight)

Terence123 wrote:
btw: is it only me or is paladin the worst boss-killer race in the entire game?
l10 is not possible with elite archer (and a "special" tactic)
l20 needs to be defended very well and is unsecure. mass priests or at least 3 gryphons are needed for magic dmg (cutting you income due to overdeff)
l30 is nearly impossible. leaked one of them even in a 7/15 round with mass gryphon spam (which in fact are just tier6 archers...they rape all levels, due to the bouncing attack, which deals a pretty large amount of damage though. but on 30 they couldnt kill the bosses fast enough. their low AS gives the bosses too much time to kill everything in sight)

I guess it's only you.
I sometimes clear level 10 and I also have seen a lot of people killing all three bosses in level 10 using archers/gryphons with 1600ish values, so is not that hard.
Level 20 is also not that hard, really. Because of his heavy armor, can be done with less than 6000 value.
Both of these bosses can be killed with the king, so they aren't really dangerous.

Level 30 is a little more hard, one of them is enough to kill a maxed king. You'll have to build smart (besides having at least 20k value), so build some non-upgraded Gryphons so the Royal ones have more time to dps and the bosses more things to kill. Priest and High Priest are good at tanking, but they lack dps and I wouldn't overbuild them. It's possible to kill all three of them, but any enemy income will greatly reduces your chances.

I usually mass all my High dps units in the one side, and I left my other flank weak, so they have an easier time focusing and stuff. Works 75% of the time.

Due to the fact that you can do really high income with paladin, reaching huge values at level 30 shouldn't be too hard. If HuanAk ever finishes 3.5 the job will be easier.

I believe the one footman is unnecessary as well as one elite archer by using a hero. I prefer the archer on the cat (mirana don't remember its name) he can also help u a lot on lvl 10. Level 10 can be a little tricky u might leak 1 low level boss it is kinda random. I always use only 2 elite archers
For lvl 20 I used 1 less footman 1 less archer 1 more gryphon and 1 more cavalier ( i believe at level 20 it was a knight no upgrade) and i only leaked 1 turtle with 10% hp and thats the only leaked level. If i remember correct u can reach 7/14 right about after arena and then upgrade to 15. Of course 30 is probably leak no matter what ( 1 boss low hp). Paladin is not that strong as u may think since there are strongest builds out there